


Epiphany

by cerie



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: Advent, Christianity, Christmas, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-27
Updated: 2013-12-27
Packaged: 2018-01-06 07:30:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1104105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cerie/pseuds/cerie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Losing faith and finding it again, or, five Christmases with Will McAvoy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Epiphany

**Author's Note:**

> Some brief mentions of physical abuse.

_December 1968_

When Will is eleven, the minister chooses him to light one of the Advent candles and read a little passage from the Bible in front of the entire church. He hadn’t really wanted to until he made the mistake of mentioning it in front of his mother and when her face lit up, he couldn’t really say no; it’s the first time he’s seen her smile in weeks. 

It’s hard to find the time to practice it. Will’s always been smart and good in school but now that his father left them, he’s having to take over more and more chores on the farm as well as help to make sure his brother and sisters have food and get out the door to school and there’s just not a lot left over for anything extra. He’s trying to make it as easy as he can on his mother, hoping that after the snow melts and the wind isn’t so cold that she’ll be happy again and he can relax.

The day that he’s supposed to read is the day the candle is a soft pink, the day that is supposed to be about joy. Sunday dawns clear and cold and he wrangles his sisters into their coats and combs their hair. His brother Matthew is nowhere to be found and after looking for a long time (and very nearly making themselves late), he finds him in the barn, hay all over his one nice suit. Will cleans him up as best he can and they all walk out to the ancient station wagon. He hopes it cranks today. He’d tried to learn how to fix it but his father had never wanted him around and underfoot for long and mostly what he’s learned is to beat on the engine and curse a lot. He doesn’t think it helps. 

His mother is numb, stiffly going through the motions of pulling on her own coat and walking out to the car and Will slips his hand in hers, squeezing her fingers lightly. She just looks _tired_. She always just looks tired, even though he knows she’s been sleeping more than anything else. Maybe it will be better when the spring comes. Will’s sick to death of winter himself.

When the minister calls him up to the front, Will is a little nervous but he thinks he’ll do okay. When he sees his father duck into the back of the church and slide into a pew, he stumbles over striking the match to light the candle and spills a little wax on his hand. Nobody seems to notice and he finds his bearings, reading out in a loud, clear voice:

“Romans 15:13. Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

There doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of hope and joy this Christmas but he’s _trying_. Maybe God can cut him a break.

_Christmas 1977_

Will is in the middle of studying for exams when he gets the call. It’s collect and from Lancaster Corrections. Apparently a sheriff’s deputy has picked up Matthew from drinking and driving and someone needs to come bail him out. Will’s only three quarters of a lawyer but he guesses he’s the best thing his brother has and he manages to get down to the jail and talk the officer into letting him out on an OR bond, on account of Matthew not having a criminal record and it being Christmas. The old deputy has always been a little sweet on Elizabeth McAvoy even if she would never file domestic violence charges against her husband and he lets them both loose into the damp sleet that seems to be ever-present this week.

“You know you’re a fucking idiot, right?” Will says, not pausing in his trek to the car even as he lights a cigarette and flicks his lighter shut. He’s been smoking a lot more these days, and drinking too, but he’s not idiot enough to get behind the wheel of a car when he does it. He has plans for getting out of Nebraska, big plans, and being disbarred before he can ever take the exam is going to derail them fast. No way. Will plays on the straight and narrow.

“It was just one drink too many,” Matthew protests, scowling, and Will thinks his brother looks too much like John McAvoy for his comfort. His father is back home these days, cruel as ever, but since Will is just a phone call and a drive across town away, he’s careful about what he does to his wife. If he’s still hitting her, he’s making sure it’s not where Will can see it but Will knows it’s the words that hurt the most. 

“I’m not going to come get you again. You’d better call Susan or Kathleen next time,” Will says gruffly. Matthew mutters under his breath and slides into the car next to him, quiet on the long way back to Will’s shitty one bedroom apartment. When he pulls into the parking lot, he cuts the car off and sits there for a moment in silence before he speaks, looking out at the sleet falling against his windshield in wet splats instead of at his brother.

“I don’t want you to turn into him, Matt. That’s all.”

Nothing more has to be said.

 _December 31, 2001_

Will isn’t at some swank NYC party this New Years’ Eve and is, instead, at Saint Elizabeth’s right smack in the middle of Nebraska even if he swore he would never come back. When his mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, Will had offered to move her out to New York with him and get her in at Sloan-Kettering for the best care possible. Elizabeth McAvoy had scoffed at that and said Saint Elizabeth’s was good enough for her and she didn’t want to be away from his father.

Yeah. Like that had done her any good at all. Still, Will couldn’t find it in himself to be angry and footed the bill for everything from transportation to chemo to radiation and surgery. He’d been flying back and forth twice a month for the past six months, wanting to spend as much time as he could with her and he harbored hate for his brother, who seemed to pretend it wasn’t happening and that everything was going to be all right. Susan and Kathleen were of the opinion that God would handle it, that everything is God’s plan, that God would envelop their mother into His arms one way or another.

Will is fucking selfish, he guesses, because he doesn’t find anything beautiful or comforting in the fact that his mother is writhing in pain and in agony. It’s been a long time since Will was anything approaching religious but he doesn’t think a merciful God, the beautiful pictures of Jesus in stained glass windows and on Sunday School books, would allow his kind, sweet mother to suffer like this. 

It should be his Dad.

It’s a fleeting thought and one that he isn’t proud of but it’s there. If anyone should be in massive pain and close to drawing his last breath, it should be his father and not his mother. He doesn’t give a shit that there’s a time for everything under the sun. It should be his son of a bitch father who is sick and dying and his mother who is healthy and hale and happy. His father hasn’t darkened the door, not since Will told him he wasn’t welcome, and when his mother draws her last breath and Will doesn’t have a feeling left in his body, he regrets having done that. He regrets it just the tiniest bit.

But more than anything, he’s fucking _angry_. Susan and Kathleen keep pressing the Bible on him and he throws it across the room, the dog-eared pages splaying against a cheap upholstered chair. He doesn’t fucking need _God_ , who didn’t keep his father from hitting his mother and hitting him. He doesn’t need Jesus, who didn’t seem to give a shit when his mother was so depressed she couldn’t do anything but stare into space and it had been Will who made sure they were all fed and had shoes and clothes. 

He doesn’t need anyone at all.

 _Christmas 2005_

Will wakes up to cool hands against his neck and a pleased little giggle that tells him that MacKenzie is pretty fucking confident he isn’t going to retaliate against her for stealing his warmth. Wrong. He tackles her beneath the blankets and tickles her, long fingers spanning across the most sensitive parts of her ribs and only when she begs him breathlessly to stop does he, propping himself up so he can just look at her.

She’s so beautiful. He’s wanted MacKenzie almost from the moment he first saw her and it had been hard not to jump right on dating her as soon as she mentioned her boyfriend dumped her. Anyone who dumps MacKenzie McHale is a fucking idiot and Will hadn’t had any shame in saying so, in taking her out and showering her with gifts even if the relationship is new and shouldn’t be quite as serious as it is.

He wants to marry her. It’s only been four months, give or take, but he wants to marry MacKenzie and give her everything she’s ever wanted. He worships her, adores her, loves her and lusts for her. He’s never felt this strongly about a woman before in his entire life and he just knows that means she’s the one. 

“You look awfully contemplative for this early in the morning,” MacKenzie says, frowning up at him. Her nose wrinkles a bit and Will notices she has a spray of freckles across her pink cheeks and the bridge of her nose. Her brown eyes crinkle up whenever she smiles and even if she isn’t laughing, it looks like one is going to escape at any second. God, he loves her. Her phone buzzes and she reaches for it, tapping out a quick message before dropping it to the floor again. She always does that, can never quite turn off being an executive producer, and he wonders if he ought to call whoever it is back and inform them that it’s fucking Christmas and they don’t need Mac right now. He decides he’d rather just distract _her_ instead.

“Just thinking about all those presents under the tree for you,” he says, brushing her hair back off her cheeks. MacKenzie scoffs and little and tugs him down for a long kiss, lips and tongue pressing against his until he’s not really sure which way is up and where he ends and she begins. It’s a recursive loop, over and over, and so smooth that it seems like this is where he’s always meant to be.

 _January 6th, 2011_

“What are we going to do about the tabloids?” It’s three in the morning and MacKenzie is quiet on the other end of the line. He almost wonders if she’s fallen asleep when she speaks again, voiced laced through with exhaustion. As hard as this has been on him, it’s been twice as hard on her and he’s had to talk her out of drafting a resignation more than once. He’s been in tight spots with ratings before and this is nothing new. What is new is MacKenzie taking responsibility for it.

“We’re just going to keep doing the news, Billy, you and me. All we can do is be the best there is at what we do and make something we can be proud of. People always try to put a candle under a basket.” 

Will laughs, trying to sort out that jumbled up reference and MacKenzie goes on to say something about bushels and pecks and he finally gathers that she’s referencing some passage in Matthew about letting your light shine. He takes a hit off his joint and recites by rote after years and years of Sunday School.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.’ Does that sound about right?”

MacKenzie laughs and says yes and they drift into talking about other things, the minutiae of their day, and it’s not lost on him that he talks to MacKenzie more than any woman he’s dated in the past several weeks. Yeah, well. She’s got a boyfriend to consider. 

It doesn’t stop him from feeling a little hope for the first time in a long time.


End file.
